Nauma Margrkind
This Viking character was created to accompany two "adoptions" of fan-species dragons, one called the WebHead Dragon, and the other a Signal Fire Dragon. The WebHead dragon was created by dragon34611 on the SOD forum thread "My first Adoptable". The Signal Fire dragon was created by Donnala on the SOD Forum topic "Signal Fire Adoptables". Clamming for Dragons Nauma Margrkind and her sister Ketiley rowed over to Skertonn Isle, a - formerly - rocky little island just off the coast of Berk. The day was still young, but proving to be as pleasant as they had hoped. Their cousin, Diggr, had landscaped the rocky island with the help of his SpikeRoller and his Zippleback, as well as the rich midden on Berk. He now had a nice bit of land for his berry farm, since the Isle of Berk itself was beginning to be overburdened with Dragons and Vikings. But the teen girls were not visiting Skertonn for Diggr's berries, but rather the island's shores. The shores were in areas rocky and pebbly, and others flat with muddy sand, and was perfect for all manner of edible shellfish - limpets, cockles, winkles, clams, and occasionally whelks. They would make a fine chowder for their family. Nauma and Ketiley rowed together briskly. Being Viking women, they were stout and had strong backs. As they approached a landable spot, Nauma took to the steerboard and guided them to a suitable landing place, while Ketiley rowed them up onto the shore. The faering butted into the pebbly sand and the girls pulled the boat the rest of the way onto the beach. Nauma looked up at the sun and sighed, pleased that they had made good time. Ketiley curled her arms upwards, making exaggerated motions to highlight her biceps. "A Viking man likes a strong woman!" she teased. Gaukr ought to look twice at your capable arms!" referring to a boy about Nauma's age, who had nice biceps himself. Nauma frowned. "Well you've got a lot to learn. They might like strength, but most like what's East and West of your arms even more. If I catch Gaukr or anyone else oogling there, they'll find out just how strong my fists are," she said huffily. It was Ketiley's turn to frown. "Well you'd better row everyday to build your strength, 'cuz those are hard to miss," she replied, pointing at Nauma's chest. Nauma was indeed a bit busty. Ketiley was two years her junior and had not yet had a big feminine growth spurt. She was as yet blissfully unaware of the tribulations of being "well" endowed. Nauma waved her hand in the air irritably. "Come on, lets get at it." She handed out four buckets, small flat daggers, hand rakes, and a small satchel with some food for lunch later on. The sisters each went in opposite directions from the boat to work the shores. Nauma's first stop was at an outcrop of rocks, craggy and wet, and slick with algae. The little wide-conical shells of limpets dotted the rocks, holding tight to their surface until the tide came back in. She pulled out the flat knife and began prying them off the rocks one by one. Limpets and most other shellfish took work to harvest, but they were food, and tasted well enough when cooked right. She pulled up some dulse, too, and lined the buckets with it. There were winkles, too, ever so slowly moving across the stones. Nauma popped and pried these off the rock as well. A few whelks sheltered in the crevices, or bothered the edges of barnacles, which she gladly added to the second bucket. She moved along efficiently, as the sun slowly moved across the sky. The rocks petered out into a wide sandy flat. Nauma's boots scrunched in the soggy sand as she walked across it, looking down for tell-tale impressions of buried clams and cockles. She pulled out her hand rake, stretched her back, then bent over to fork and scoop at the mud. The prongs pulled up the creatures and into her bucket they went. Occasionally she had to knock down the winkles and whelks, as they decided a bucket was not where they wanted to be. The sun kept moving across the sky. Nauma stretched occasionally. She was young, but the work still pulled on her back. At one point she saw a shape out in the sea. Perhaps a whale, or a dragon; maybe even a boat. She bent over and pulled up a few more clams and looked again. The shape seemed to have gotten closer. Nauma grew a little uneasy. The swimming object looked to be a dragon of some sort, and it looked like it was heading in her direction. She wasn't afraid of dragons, at least the tame ones, but it would be grossly unwise to forget that they could be very dangerous. The dragon kept advancing. He was brown with bright orange webbing on his wings and on his head. In fact he had a lot of webbing on his head. He reached the shallows and waded out, revealing short thick legs with orange-webbed toes. Nauma stood transfixed for a moment, then took a step back, then another. The dragon advanced upon her with some intent in his sky-blue eyes. "Oh Thor ..." Nauma muttered under her breath, and turned to run in earnest, muddy sand slurping at her boots. But she was not nearly fat enough, and ended up tripping into the sand. She rolled over quickly and held up the clamming rake in front of her defensively. The dragon towered over her. Why was this dragon charging at her like a boar? Did he eat Vikings? Was she in his territory? Was she the object of revenge for some previous ill the dragon had suffered? "What do you want ... you ... Boar Breath!" Nauma yelled shrilly at the dragon. BoarBreath's jaw looked a bit swollen, with black charred streaks on his mouth. A bit of his last meal, it looked like, poked out of the sides of his mouth. A slobbery wet something smacked onto her lap. It was some kind of small purple lizard dragon. Did the BoarBreath just vomit his last meal on her?? But then the little dragon's eye swiveled up to look at her irately, and he righted himself and began chittering angrily at her. BoarBreath grunted and sat down on his haunches, gazing at her expectantly. Nauma just sat there, perplexed, nervous under the glares of not one, but two dragons. She took a deep breath and tried to think rationally. The big dragon hadn't eaten or savaged her and, at the moment, didn't appear inclined to do so. The little dragon must've been in the big dragon's mouth, not in his belly, else he wouldn't still be alive. He did look injured though, by the way he had one wing tucked comfortably against his body and the other laid out uncomfortably. He looked to be an arboreal species, while the big dragon seemed like a creature of the sea. Had BoarBreath hunted down the little one, grabbed him, then relented at eating him? That didn't seem likely. But BoarBreath had brought the little dragon to her, it seemed. Did he expect her to help him? What Nauma did not know and may never surmise, was that the little Signal Fire dragon had lived well on a forested island with others of his kind in the trees. A great storm blew across the island one day recently. A scared member of his kind resided in an old tree on a cliff by the sea and the wind was breaking branches and violently shaking the tree. The scared dragon let loose her spine flares, calling the purple one and other to her aid. They came to her and her tree, but the storm spewed lightning upon the tree and cleaved it in half. The wood and Signal Fires tumbled into the turbulent sea. Most perished. The purple fellow, though. lived, but with a broken wing, could not remove himself from the sea. He got carried away in the current away from his island, to either drown or be eaten. But neither happened. Instead the curious and friendly WebHead came upon him and picked him up with his mouth. The little dragon shot his remaining flare spines at him, but the Webhead carried him on, looking for help. Nauma was the first creature he saw that might be able to do so. While Nauma considered, BoarBreath turned and sniffed her discarded buckets. There was food there, but much to small for him. So he picked up the buckets and laid them in front of the confused Viking girl. These were not the actions of an angry dragon. Nauma sighed. The only thing to do was to be brave and confident, and help this little dragon. Didn't the Dragon Riders say to show no fear and to be calm? She took off her coat and patted the little purple dragon as dry as she could. He hissed at her, but allowed her ministrations. Nauma attempted to make a sling of some sort, but instead the little dragon crawled under her shirt and onto her chest. He shifted about, needle-like claws pricking her skin, then settled down and was quiet. He hadn't been warm and cozy for a while. "Well, I ought to pummel you senseless, I think? You've gone far beyond mere ogling, Mister, uhm, Mister ... FlashFlare!" Nauma muttered under her breath. It was not the most comfortable position for her, but at least her hands were free to carry the buckets. Nauma slowly stood, not wanting to startle either dragon. The WebHead leaned forward and sniffed her chest, hot odorous breath causing her nose to wrinkle. "Satisfied?" she murmured, then on impulse she reached up and touched BoarBreath's muzzle. He gurgled and seemed to enjoy her touch. The dragon seemed amicable, perhaps too much so for his own good. What if he had found someone less than friendly with dragons? "Good thing you found me instead," Nauma said aloud. "Berk is a good place to be for dragons." She shifted her hand to the dragon's chin and scratched there, too. "Let's get this little flaming flare dragon to Gothi." Nauma turned away, picked up the buckets and started making her way back to the faering. Whether out of curiosity, or a sense of duty, or something else, BoarBreath plodded along behind. What in Midgard would Ketiley think? Information About the WebHead Dragon (Taken from the creator's, dragon34611, own words on the SOD forum thread "My first Adoptable".) The Web Head is a tidal class dragon and is also vary docile for its body and size. This dragon was never documented in the book of dragons since it is so rare to find. About the Signal Fire Dragon (written by creator Donnala on the thread "Signal Fire Adoptables") Signal Fire’s are small, the size of a Terrible Terror. That makes them a natural prey to bigger dragons, such as Changewings and more. Therefore, they can camouflage themselves, but only against plants. If they are scared or being threatened, they release a single spike from their backs, which would explode in high up in the air, signaling other Signal Fire’s to help. They’d then fire another spike from their wing, a warning shot to hold the dragon off while the rest of the Signal Fire’s join. They’d surround the dragon(s), each angling their wings in the direction of the dragon, threatening to release a spike that would explode on top of the dragon. If the dragon does not leave yet, they all at once fire a warning shot into the air. The dragon usually then leaves, but then and only then would they actually use their spikes to injure another dragon. Signal Fire’s natural habitat is forests, where there are lots of plants to camouflage themselves. They eat mostly plants, but if they find dead meat they’d also happily eat that. Signal Fire’s are usually quite vicious, but do not attack unless necessary. They are trainable, but you will most likely get one or two scars in the process. Additional Information * A Faering is a small clinker-built boat usually having two sets of oars. Occasionally they may have a small sail, too. * Vikings and other peoples of Scandinavia and the British Isles areas have been eating Molluscs for eons. Limpets are small, single-shelled invertebrates that inhabit the tidal zones. Winkles, or periwinkles, are small abundant snails. Cockles are a bivalve somewhat similar in appearance to clams. Whelks are relatively large, predatory shellfish. Some species were harvested for the minute quantities of a dye used to get Tyrian Purple, very expensive and popular to the Romans. Vikings also ate mussels and oysters. * The last name, "Margrkind", is a composite of two Old Norse words. Margr means "many" and Kind means "folk" or "family". In my stories the Margrkinds are a very large extended family of Berk. In this story, Diggr Margrkind is mentioned. Related Stories There are a number of other stories about members of the Margrkind family and their "adopted" dragons including: * ''Bogbert Margrkind'' * ''Diggr Margrkind'' * ''Finngeirr Margrkind'' * Ketiley Margrkind Category:Fanfiction Category:Fan-Fiction stories Category:LadyBrasa's Adoption OCs